


Say Something

by fineinthemorning



Series: It Would Be a Tragedy [2]
Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: Angst, Character Death, Gen, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-05
Updated: 2015-11-05
Packaged: 2018-04-30 04:13:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5149868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fineinthemorning/pseuds/fineinthemorning
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tsukiyama Shuu is captured, not killed, but within the confines of his cell, what does he have left to hold onto? This is a short one-shot about giving up.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Say Something

Strength. He didn’t know the meaning of the word anymore.

Physically, he was what could be called strong, right? It depended on what one was being compared to.

Mentally, he was what could be called strong, right? Right?  _Right?_

He looked at the ghoul beneath him- the one he  _couldn’t_  kill.

Fortitude.

Face to face with his past, he lacked any strength of mind at all.

For, even if it was something he could not remember, even if it was something that happened long ago, it was still a part of him. This ghoul … somehow, he was still a part of him.

Indecision. Escape.

Mentally, he was what could be called strong, right?  _Wrong._

<><><>

“Wait! I need your help!”

Sasaki stared. He’d nearly killed the ghoul, the Tsukiyama heir, and now he was asking for his  _help_? He’d just had his arm cut off by some ghoul, though clearly from Aogiri, was obviously acting in the heir’s interest so why-?!

“Please. He’s precious to me. Please help me end his-“

“Master Shuu, you’d really- I knew it! For him! Everything- die Drecksau! Spinnst du oder was?”

“Kanae, stop this!”

Sasaki stared, eyes falling back and forth between them, forgetting the pain in his arm only briefly. Whose side were these people on? Whose side was he on? Who was his ally? His enemy? No, who was he? He was Sasaki Haise. He was Kaneki Ken.

Help? Who needed help?

Who fucking needed help?!

He did the only thing he had the strength left for.

He screamed.

<><><>

It had been a month since then. He had seen evidence of Kaneki, briefly, that night, but since then- nothing.

He hadn’t known that _she_ had been there in the same place as him, but he’d found out. The ghouls spoke to one another during their brief periods in which they could walk around outside or within the confines of the main hall- well, the well-behaved ones could, anyway. Shuu was well-behaved, but he was also deemed too dangerous due to his rather extensive history and lengthy list of crimes what with being the Gourmet and everything. He’d never actually found out how they’d found him out, but they had, so apart from being the Tsukiyama heir, he was also imprisoned for being the famed Gourmet- on top of merely being a ghoul.

The walls had spoken her name. He tried speaking back to them, but it was a one way signal. He could hear whispers of the outside world, but he was never allowed to make contact.

Still, she must have known, She must have known that he was there as well. The Tsukiyama heir. The Gourmet. Whispers. She must have heard them.  

She was a strong woman, now. How was he sure? It wasn’t the walls that had told him. No, it had been in the way she had smiled at him back then, knowingly, patiently. It had been in the way she treated Kaneki and in the way she cared for all of them, sweet and wise beyond her years. She hadn’t been a child for long, but most ghouls never were unless they’d been born into privilege- like himself.

The walls had said her time was up. They’d said she was taking responsibility for her past crimes. They’d spelled, with their many whispers, _execution_.

Was this a testament to the truth? Was this the true reality of the world Shuu lived in now?

One in which the Tsukiyama family was dead?

His only friend was dead?

His second family was dead?

Kaneki … his- dead?

Sasaki Haise hadn’t even saved her.

And neither had he. Tsukiyama hadn’t saved her, either.

He hadn’t kept the little mouse safe.

Kanae. Matsumae. His father.

And, back then, he hadn’t been strong enough to stop him-

Shuu used the red that bubbled up from his wrist to paint the walls.

A sprinkle of four leaf clovers.

A precious rose. And several more.

A carnation surrounded by forget-me-nots.

Everything a beautiful red.

Shuu knew beauty, and, after losing everything, he realized that no matter how ugly the world could be there was still hope as long as there was life.

<><><>  

The Quinx had joined him in Cochlea. He wasn’t sure why, but as soon as he had answered Saiko’s request to know where he was going, she had texted the others and within minutes, the others had come downstairs to join him. They didn’t ask who he was visiting. For some reason, they all knew. It might have been that it was the month anniversary since the Exterminate Rose Operation. It might have been that it had been that he hadn’t quite been himself that day. Or, maybe, it was the fact there was no one else to visit. Well, there was the Donato, but he was visited on particular days rather regularly, and it wasn’t the girl, because well, she had been-

Sasaki himself wasn’t sure why they had come with him to Cochlea, but when he’d agreed to their company, he had realized that he’d needed it.

See, he was feeling one particular emotion rather strongly and had all day.

Fear.

It was stronger than anything he had felt in some time and it was being felt by both himself and the one who existed inside him.

When they had entered the interrogation room, the ghoul sat on the other side of the glass in a corner on the floor quite nearly dead to the world around him.

_He needs my help! He’s going to die! You can’t let him die! You can’t let him die! You can’t let him die!_

Sasaki collapsed.

Immediately, Mutsuki and Shirazu were on him in a second on either side of him, their hands trying to hold him steady as he panted, struggling for control of his mind and over his body as he fell to his knees.

Saiko took a step back. Urie didn’t pull away when she grabbed his hand.

Kaneki didn’t speak to them. He said not a word to either of them. When he stood, ignoring them completely, it was Shirazu and Mutsuki’s turns to take steps back. They knew from the atmosphere alone that this wasn’t their mentor. This wasn’t the man they’d come to know and trust- to love.

“Tsukiyama.”

“Kaneki.”

Broken. Fragile. Death. A matter of time only.

They weren’t separated merely by glass, but by time and loss and secrets-

“What are you doing?”

Tsukiyama went silent, words sucked dry merely from being in his presence. He was here now. Now. But where had he been? If this were possible, where had he been then- for her? Or for him? For everyone he’d lost he-

“Are you giving up?” He waited on the other side of the glass, life visible in heated breaths.

Shuu slowly stood. Maybe this was a dream. Maybe it was a hallucination. Maybe the whole thing wasn’t even happening at all, but whatever it was, it was all he had left.

He stood, walked over the man he’d once pledged his life to, and knelt down, his head lowered.

“ _I’ll always stay by your side_.”

Kaneki remembered. His voice quivered, “Then what are you doing?”

“Waiting. As your sword, what would you have me do?”

Kaneki crouched down to be eye level with the man he’d destroyed and asked him for, perhaps, the most selfish thing of all, “ _Live._ ”

A small, apologetic smile.

Shuu looked up. He only saw it briefly, because once the tears had begun, they wouldn’t stop.

Hatred. Love. Fear. Hope. Guilt Pride. Rage. Gratitude.

The fondness in the ghoul’s voice was heavy, the edge all but gone now, “ _Promise me._ ”

Kaneki assumed he understood, “I’ll save-“

“ _You won’t blame yourself._ ”

Kaneki’s eyes were wide. For a moment, their eyes met, and the half-ghoul felt something gripping, meaningful, and prophetic that reduced him to little more than a human who, in its life full of infinite possibility, saw all of it shatter the moment he dared reach for that silver thread of hope.

And he was gone.

Sasaki blinked several times and when he tried pieced together that he’d lost control of his body, he attempted to gather the attention of the ghoul on the others side of the glass, but it was too late. The Tsukiyama heir had turned away, and, without a word, stood, walked back to the corner of the room, and sat down- sullen, defeated, and still without hope.

Sasaki looked back at the Quinx that were waiting quite nearly in a line by the door. Urie immediately covered his accusations in his expression. Saiko did nothing to hide her concern. Mutsuki, perplexed, had an expression somewhere on the edge of fear and sadness. And finally, Shirazu was portraying something between confidence and genuine concern.

Sasaki had lost control of his own body, and there hadn’t even been a fight. There was no begging on the other end of his subconscious. There was no whispering taunt of impatience. There wasn’t even a quiet, malicious threat of the inevitable disappearance of his existence altogether.

One moment he was there, and the next, he wasn’t.

He looked back to the ghoul in the cage, “Tsukiyama?”

But the ghoul didn’t respond.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading~ This fic is based off of the song 'Say Something' by A Great Big World.


End file.
